Ovilu Tunnillie

Ovilu Tunnillie, sculptor (b at Cape Dorset, NWT 20 Dec 1949). Ovilu comes from an artistic Cape Dorset family; her parents were the noted artists Toonoo and Sheokjuke. Ovilu is in the vanguard of younger northern artists whose work goes beyond the traditional concern for the past evidenced in much contemporary period art of the Inuit. With themes ranging from alcohol abuse and rape to memories of her time in a southern TB clinic, Ovilu freely depicts the inter-cultural reality of the contemporary Inuk woman. Rendered in the distinctive serpentinite common to South Baffin, Ovilu's formal vocabulary is distinctive and personal, employing ropy volumes, broad flattish planes and a strong sense of design to give much of her work an architectural quality. Her sculptures have been widely exhibited, including in the exhibition Inuit Woman Artists organized by the Canadian Museum of Civilization in 1994.